The L.A. Kings have solidified their status as a regular Stanley Cup-playoff team in the Pacific Division. And in this cover story from THN’s 2021-22 Prospects Unlimited edition, writer Ken Campbell profiled the Kings’ strategy on building a consistent winner:
By Ken Campbell
Jaret Anderson-Dolan won 86 faceoffs at the Staples Center last season. And each time he did, Jarret Stoll would allow himself to smile, and perhaps puff out his chest a little like a proud father. Because with each of those faceoff wins, Stoll gained some validation in the knowledge that his Jarret-on-Jaret tutelage was paying off. “I’d be watching from the press box and to see him win a key faceoff and to win it the way you taught him to win it, that’s what really pumps you up and gets you excited,” Stoll said. “Of course, I was really happy for him, but I was also thinking that all these things that I was teaching and preaching were actually working.”
The Los Angeles Kings have missed the playoffs four of the past five seasons, and the one time they made it, they were swept in four straight by an expansion team. But they do have those two Stanley Cup banners, so there’s that. Those championships, as they always do, came with a price. And they paid in cash. It’s been seven years since the Kings won the Stanley Cup and, in all likelihood, it will be eight after this season.
While they aren’t quite out of the woods in their period of reckoning, there is every reason to believe that good days are ahead. Very good days. If you’re in the business of grading prospect lists, L.A.’s group of young players is probably in your top three. It might even be No. 1. The Kings really like their group of futures, and so do a lot of other people.
But it’s not just drafting that has vaulted the Kings to where they are. Truth be told, part of the reason their prospect list is so good is because the team itself was so bad that it put the organization in a position to draft Alex Turcotte fifth, Quinton Byfield second and Brandt Clarke eighth in three successive years. Anybody can do that. But where the Kings have really focused their efforts is on development, which brings us back to Stoll working the dots with Anderson-Dolan.
When director of player personnel Nelson Emerson was on a scouting trip in Canada in mid-October, former Kings Matt Greene and Sean O’Donnell were essentially holding a mini development camp with defenseman Helge Grans, a Swedish prospect who converted…